Sportsnet.ca -- Take a close look, Vancouver. Friday might be the last time Steve Nash takes to the court in his home province in a NBA uniform.

Six years after the Grizzlies packed up and left for Memphis, the National Basketball Association returns to Vancouver Friday for a pre-season tilt between Nash's Phoenix Suns and the Seattle Sonics.

The Victoria point guard is still going strong at 33, but he's definitely on the back nine of his career and there's no guarantee the NBA will schedule another contest in his home province before his playing days are done.

So the potential is there for this to be much more than your typical NBA pre-season game.

It could be Nash's NBA finale in front of his home fans.

"It's special for me to come home to play, for sure," Nash told the Vancouver Sun. "But it's also special to take my teammates to Vancouver because most of these guys never got to play there when the Grizzlies were around. I want to share with them what a great city it is and what great basketball fans there are in B.C."

Nash told the paper he wasn't sure how many times he's played in Vancouver, but he feels the city and its basketball fans deserved better from the Grizzlies.

"I really thought the fans there were great; they supported a poor team for years. What more could you ask them to do?

"Of course, I felt terrible for the fans and city, as well as the NBA [when the Grizzlies moved]. Coming back and playing as an opponent was special for me. But I always felt that maybe one day I would play there (for the Grizzlies). For me to come back and play there, it would have been a great thing."

Friday he will be playing in front of them.

And while Vancouver's experience with the Grizzlies may have soured a lot of people on NBA basketball, Steve Nash alone has done more to promote the game in this part of Canada than any team ever could.